I think I long suspected that being rich and famous doesn’t stop you from being an idiot or jerk, even some celebrities might realise this. Not to mention when it comes to shady secrets, the more appealing the facade is the more horrifying dark and deep those secrets get. It’s like in Hollywood where for a long time some celebrities were suspected of being queer. Even moreso had homosexuality been criminalised.
Cary Grant was suspected of being gay, so much so that he and his peers had arranged marriages to conceal the odd possibility. (I think love marriage practically more or less begat gay marriage.) It’s still not confirmed whether if he’s gay or not but it does show you how shady secrets can get. It’s like wanting to have the most perfect life as well making oneself and others repress feelings but also going against better parenting advice and certain religions.
Especially if/when they prioritise austerity and greater self-restraint. It’s one thing to appear calm and happy, it’s another to exercise far more self-control in other weak spots like alcoholism and the like. (It’s actually not wrong to spend money on things, especially if they’re useful.) Such a family could be highly abusive, violent or perhaps not as well-adjusted as they make themselves out to be.
Alternately speaking, you could be a genuinely law-abidding citizen trying to do your best but be hated by everybody else. (Rao help if Vlad the Impaler turns out to be in Heaven, thus making him the medieval version of Donald Trump*.) So it seems the shadier the secret, the more surprising it gets. And if the more maligned the person is, the more misunderstood they get especially if it’s something that’s actually good or understandable.
Something like Vlad the Impaler’s fight against Turkish invaders would sit well with Islamophobes when you think about it. Or that Mother Theresa’s far from saintly.
*Donald Trump gets associated with Harry Potter’s Voldemort, Vlad the Impaler’s equated with Dracula.
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